Daryl Lorenz
is the deuteragonist of the Mobile Suit Gundam Thunderbolt manga and its ONA adaptations. Personality & Character Daryl has tanned skin, brown eyes, and a shaggy afro. He is introduced as a pilot with prosthetic legs, having lost them in ground combat on Earth and is a member of Zeon's Living Dead Division in space. As the fighting rages, Daryl eventually loses both his arms as well; one lost in combat, and the other voluntarily removed to pilot the MS-06R Zaku High Mobility Type (Reuse "P" Device). He is shown to be a composed and competent mobile suit sniper, and later on a very aggressive and sharp mobile suit pilot in the Zaku High Mobility Type (Reuse "P" Device). Daryl is also a competent commander and leader of troops, going from simple sniper to mobile suit team and company leader to eventually commanding his own Zeon Remnant Commando Squad. Daryl is portrayed as being empathetic to most people and has some pretty natural charisma. Moreover, he has a strong desire to protect his team and those he cares about, as seen when he agreed to having his remaining arm amputated in order to control the Zaku High Mobility Type (Reuse "P" Device). Daryl's preferred music genres are the blues, country and pop, and he usually will listen to them while out on a mission to help him relax and focus. Skills & Abilities Daryl is the ace sniper of the Living Dead Division and has extraordinary skills in tracking the enemy and shooting them down. In addition to sniping, Daryl is also good at thinking on his feet, briefly holding his own against Federation ace pilot Io Fleming and his FA-78 Full Armor Gundam (Thunderbolt Ver.), even in an older model MS-05 Zaku I (Thunderbolt Ver.). Daryl is speculated to be a Newtype by his comrades, and he may very well be one since he showed exceptional skill in sniping and piloting the Zaku High Mobility Type (Reuse "P" Device). Daryl seems to also be quite the tactical thinker, able to think of and correctly guess his enemies' battle plans. His leadership abilities add to this making him the ideal choice to replace Hoover, after his death, as Mobile Suit Team Leader. History Daryl's family was originally on Earth as part of a group of Zeon merchants, yet was later exiled due to citizen protests. Upon moving to the space colonies, he enlisted in the army as an Infantryman in order to earn the right for him and his family to become citizens of Zeon. He lost both of his legs during an assault following Zeon's Earth Drop/Invasion operations yet was told he would still be able to fight as a mobile suit pilot. He has a mother and younger sister (he lost his father sometime after moving into outer space). In December 0079, Daryl and the Living Dead Division are assigned to hold the Thunderbolt Sector against encroaching Federation Forces. Although Daryl and his squad, consisting of fellow snipers Fisher and Shawn, managed to decimate the attacking Federal forces, they are caught off-guard by Federation ace pilot Io Fleming, who had closed in on their location after his RGM-79 GM had been shot down. Daryl is forced to watch helplessly as Fleming kills his superior, Ensign Hoover, and appropriates his MS-09R Rick Dom. Daryl then promises to shoot Fleming down the next time they meet. Daryl and his remaining squadmates return Hoover's body to their mothership, where they learn that the Ensign had been in a relationship with the Head of Prosthesis, Professor Karla Mitchum. Karla begs Daryl to avenge Hoover by killing Io, but Daryl simply asks for some pain medication to treat his legs. Daryl then tests the Reuse Psycho Device, affixed to an incomplete custom Zaku. Afterwards, Daryl and his squad attend a de-briefing where they learn of the appearance of the FA-78 Full Armor Gundam in the Thunderbolt Sector, Daryl suspects that his rival Fleming is the pilot and sets out with his squad to confront the Gundam. Daryl sorties in a MS-05 Zaku I alongside his fellow comrades and heads for Side 4 to ambush any approaching Federal Forces. They encounter Fleming piloting the Federation's new Gundam and engage him. Despite working together, they are unable to keep up with the Gundam's performance. Daryl manages to escape by reflecting a flare of the Solar Panels, blinding the Gundam. Unfortunately, he is grievously injured during the battle and loses his left forearm, and his close friend Shawn is killed by Fleming in the battle. Under these circumstances, Sexton suggested that they have to use the experimental Zaku that uses the Reuse Psycho Device as a countermeasure to the Gundam. Daryl agrees to have his remaining armed removed in order to push the Reuse system to its full potential. Upon conducting a test flight after his surgery, Daryl is promoted to Ensign and made the Living Dead Division's Mobile Suit team's Commander. With the Earth Federation planning an offensive through the Thunderbolt Sector, the Living Dead Division is ordered to stave off their advance until reinforcements can arrive. Daryl seeking to destroy Fleming for killing his friends is confronted by Karla, who after telling him her reasons for taking part in the research program is surprised to hear Daryl's upbeat mindset. Telling her that they can still expect miracles and that they'll be together and smiling after this Karla removes her hair band, giving it Daryl to wear on his sortie, and kisses him. When the Federation launches its attack, Living Dead Division mobile suits, under Daryl, wreak havoc with their advance. Ambushing and sniping Federation mobile suits, which are being piloted by inexperienced and young soldiers causes their attack to break down after suffering heavy losses. Daryl working with a Sniper equipped Gattle space fighter, attacks the Federation fleet moving through the sector. Though the sniper is killed after its first successful shot Daryl attacks with the Reuse Psycho Zaku and decimates the Federation fleet by destroying three Salamis and one carrier class ships. After finding out that the Living Dead flagship is dead in the water from the Gundam Daryl confronts it in a destroyed colony cylinder. Fleming and Daryl battle it out furiously in the colony each gaining and then losing the upper hand. In the end, the Psycho Zaku shuts down after crashing into the cockpit, and Fleming was about to deal the final blow with the Gundam's beam saber, Daryl thinks of Karla and the life they could have together when a fateful bolt of lightning, apparently originating from the Dried Fish, strikes the Psycho Zaku, momentarily reactivating it and allowing him to fire his final Sturm Faust. The Sturm Faust destroys the Gundam's head, causing its beam saber to miss the cockpit, making their battle a draw, which infuriates Fleming, while Daryl thinks that his true miracle was him meeting Karla. Having sustained severe damage, Daryl was forced to abandon the Psycho Zaku, which then exploded. Although the battle between Fleming and Daryl was a draw, the overall battle was not. Succeeding in briefly capturing the hulk of the Dried Fish, the surviving Federation crews are nevertheless forced to abandon ship when a Zeon soldier detonated its ammunition storage. Io and the surviving members of the Moore Brotherhood are all captured by the Zeon reinforcements that Fisher brought. Daryl tries to console a traumatized Karla, who after witnessing several comrades being vaporized during the Federation's boarding action, is now almost comatose. Daryl and the other surviving Living Dead Division members are relocated to A Baoa Qu and reformed under Daryl. Daryl eventually confronts Fleming in his holding cell, after several fellow Living Dead members had worked him over, to talk about their battle. However, it mostly turns into Fleming taunting Daryl over his crippled condition. Daryl and his remaining forces join the battle for A Baoa Qu, however, Daryl's prosthetics prevent him from effectively piloting his Gelgoog. With the battle and with it the war lost, Daryl and the other Living Dead Division soldiers flee and form a commando unit with the Zeon Remnant forces six months after the war. Daryl, now a Commando squad commander, has soldiers not just from the former Living Dead Division but other former units of the Zeon military working with him. On Earth, since the war's end Daryl had been assisting in Karla's recovery from the trauma of the battle in the Thunderbolt sector, which has left her mentally frail and regressing her to an adolescent state who views Daryl as her father. Upon receiving information that the South Seas Alliance has acquired the Reuse Psycho Device system, Daryl leads a commando raid to steal it from them and bring it back to the remaining Zeon forces. Extracting a Zeon spy from the jungle and destroying a squad of South Sea Alliance GM's, Daryl has show extraordinary growth as a pilot. Gallery Gundam-thunder-02.jpg|Daryl and his Zaku. 20120510125540-97710.jpg Daryl Lorenz past.jpg|Daryl's past, where he lost his legs during combat. Daryl Lorenz test MS-06R Zaku High Mobility Type Reuse P Device.jpg|Daryl tests his personal Zaku. Daryl Lorenz naked.JPG|Daryl's limbs replaced with cybernetic prostheses. Notes & Trivia *His English voice actor, Johnny Yong Bosch, also provides the voice of Orga Itsuka in Mobile Suit Gundam IRON-BLOODED ORPHANS.